The Victors

The afternoon heat over the Serengeti did not care about Michigan football, or the boy McCoy whose knee had given out on the hardwood in Zagreb. It cared only for dust and dry grass.

Under the acacia canvas, MasterBates poured two fingers of warm gin. Across the collapsible table sat Daytripper, cleaning the lock of a heavy double-barrel rifle.

"They say McCoy is done," Daytripper said. He did not look up from the iron. "Ankle or knee. The board is in a panic."

"The board is always in a panic," MasterBates said. "They worry about Noland. They worry about Gayle. They sit in Ann Arbor and talk of paella at Aventura while the world burns down around them."

A vultures’ shadow drifted over the dirt floor of the mess tent. Outside, the tracker, plug, came out of the thorn scrub. He wiped sweat from his eyes with the back of a scarred hand.

"The wind has shifted," plug said. "Toledo is the lock of the week, but the lion in East Lansing is weak. Four wins. Maybe five."

"Fitz takes his Ls where he finds them," MasterBates said. He drank the gin. It tasted of oil and juniper. "What of the news from the coast?"

"Trump has renamed the salt water again," plug said cleanly. "He calls it Lake America now. He trades words with Canada while Navarro calls the prime minister a fool. It is all talk. The trade wars are like bad weather. They pass, or they kill the crops."

Daytripper snapped the rifle action shut. The click was sharp in the heavy air. "Poster P has troubles with a woman," he said. "Her ex-man drinks by eight in the morning. A coward’s hour."

"A bad business," MasterBates said. "He should break the lease and leave. In Africa, when a rogue bull comes into camp, you do not try to reason with it. You shoot or you run."

Down by the dry riverbed, a hyena laughed, high and thin like a lawyer using ChatGPT.

"We lost Haynes," Daytripper remarked, squinting out toward the red horizon where the sun was beginning to drop. "A true beast on the run. Seven yards a pop."

"Marshall will take the weight," plug said. "And the frosh, Hiter. Youth is good until the first hit comes."

"Everything is good until the hit comes," MasterBates said.

They sat in silence for a long time as the twilight turned the sky the color of bruised plums.